"The impossible voyage of an improbable crew to find an inconceivable creature..."

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Wreck This Journal

Have you heard of the book “Wreck This Journal”? I saw it at B&N about 2 years ago. The title is the kind that compels you to pick the book up. I flipped through and thought it was the stupidest thing ever. The book commanded you to “chew on this page”, “fill this page with circles”, take it in the shower with you…Take a book in the shower??!! A book!! Dumb and destructive and juvenile. Who would write such a thing? Who would publish such a thing? I dismissed it.

I have no idea what really changed my mind. But I really changed my mind. 2 years later (almost to the date) I insisted that Kelly stop at B&N when he was in Medford and BUY this book immediately. I must have it.

Now I’m an addict. I love this book and I can’t entirely articulate why. The best I can say is that I’ve always struggled with the process of creation. I want a perfect, finished product every time I set out to do something. You can imagine how far I get with expectations like that. But this book has changed the game. I’ve been pulling out art supplies that I haven’t touched in years and I work with abandon because it doesn’t matter! I meticulously drew circles with markers and metallic pencils and then afterwards, someone, who shall remain nameless, threw the book in a creek. The materials weren’t all water soluble and the circles pretty much disappeared. I was annoyed for a bit but then I realized that’s the whole point. Create. Destroy. Play. Detach. The book has some character now that it has warped somewhat. I keep reworking pages and tossing the book around everywhere and well, it’s really fun and oddly freeing.

There are groups dedicated the art of wrecking. Here are some of my pages. What are you waiting for? Wreck! Wreck! Create! Create and Wreck!

Cover this page using only office supplies

Compost this page. Watch it deteriorate. I threw it in my worm bin. Updates to follow.